Inside Buy More: Rail Gun & The Flux Capacitor - Inside Buy More

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Rail Gun & The Flux Capacitor

#1 User is offline   Mark_in_Hollywood 

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Posted 17 December 2008 - 08:51 AM

In addition to my degree in High Explosives Chemistry, I also have a degree in Electrical Engineering. These two, combined allow me to create, design, prototype and scale up for manufacturing a variety of interesting and useful devices. Unfortunately, most of them are quite destructive and therefore not appropriate (or nice) for a "show & tell" at the Buy More Breakroom.

But before you read any further, I want to remind you kids to "not try this at home" and be sure to wear safety glasses, which even Anna would look stylish in.

As you know, the Lorenz force decreases drastically with a reduction in current, and below a minimum current the accelerating force drops below the projectile frictional force and thus power is dissipated with no extra kinetic energy being imparted into the projectile. In order to counter this loss, the ideal railgun electrical pulse shape is a square wave with rapidly increasing pulse current, a high plateau, and a fast current decay. Such a pulse shape can be approximated through a Pulse Forming Network (PFN).

As with the previous Rail Gun, this power supply consists of Cornell-Dubilier Inverter Grade capacitors, each rated at 6300uF and 400V (450V Surge). These capacitors utilize the latest technology in electrolytic capacitor construction to store 640J each in a can measuring only 3" dia. x 5.63" length and weighting 900grams each. Each individual capacitor has a 50K Ohm 10W wire wound resistor for charge equalization and also to serve as a bleeder to prevent unwanted charge build-up when power is switched off. They are charged through a 900 Ohm current limiting resistor and can be safely discharged through a 6.25kOhm resistor bank mounted inside the bank. In order to counter skin effect related losses the capacitors are inter connected by very large surface area (30in2) oxygen free copper strips each 0.064" thick (1.6mm). The bank is internally fitted with a Fluke 80K6 6-kV probe for voltage monitoring.

So if you will please see the picture, below, you will know what I mean. It's a picture of me in the Breakroom, with the gun aimed towards the Orange Orange wall. I was hoping to blow a pinhole sized hole in the wall so that I could see Sarah Walker change into her Orange Orange uniform. Unfortunately, the hole was a little larger than I expected and Big Mike is taking the repair costs out of my salary ($12 per hour) for the next 3 years. sigh, and I never got to check Chuck's BFF out, half naked.

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Mark Hollywood
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#2 User is offline   Justadude 

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Posted 30 December 2008 - 11:54 AM

What'd you do to the breakroom?

P.S. If I'm not mistaken Sarah is Chuck's GF not his BFF
P.P.S I can't acualy have a "P.S." because i don't have a signature.
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#3 User is offline   Mark_in_Hollywood 

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Posted 30 December 2008 - 01:19 PM

View PostJustadude, on Dec 30 2008, 08:54 PM, said:

What'd you do to the breakroom?


I had asked Lester to ask Millbarge (may his smell stay 50 yards away) to let me clear out the cage of stuff removed from customer's audio and gps systems. It was while I was doing this that I saw the rails from some store shelving that hadn't been used since Buy More went to the modular shelving style. So when Patel said that Millbarge (may his name mean 'skank' forever) said that I had the "go ahead", I went ahead as you can see from the picture.

The funny thing was when Anna showed up and was peeping into the OrangeOrange ladies' restroom, but later I saw her in there when Morgan was on-break, so I guess she was just trying to 'drum up business'.

I gotta go, I hear Millbarge coming (actually smell him coming)
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